"Second place in your first competition isn't anything to scoff at, Ron," Daniela said, patting me on the shoulder even as Samuel worked on my Ichored hand muscles. When Daniela is cheering you up, you know it was bad.

"I don't know who was more shocked," Jolene said. "The two tied for second place, or Horace when he realized you were only a point behind him."

"You couldn't have done better, Mr. Terrigan!" Billy said, giving me what I assumed he thought was an encouraging thumbs up. Samuel just mumbled about me being a masochist idiot while Blobby seemed to be fretting over me like a mother hen.

Despite the terrible attempts at cheering me up, I couldn't help but crack a smile. Sure enough, I hadn't gotten a win, but it didn't mean we were out of contention or even giving a bad showing. If Horace's scowl was any indication then we were on a good track.

"What's next?" I asked, focusing back on the announcer. Apparently Radolfo was taking a break, since the man was nowhere to be seen.

"They are giving an hour of preparation before the next event. I'm up," Jolene said, pointing at the bag she had slung across her back. "Filomena gave me some tips and suggestions so I wanted to make sure to implement them."

"And leveraging our meager budget for said tips," Daniela said, wiggling her eyebrows suggestively.

Jolene blushed blue, but excused herself before heading towards the announcers tower. Two other of the competitors for the Mage Dance joined followed close behind while the others set up their own accommodations. The Nash grew an entire hut in seconds, the Clansmen turned their platform into a hole in the ground and Sargon encased the Breakers in a dome of blue-red fire.

Each were clearly demonstrations of power, so I flexed our own a bit. Power flowed through me and into my amulet as I adjusted the parameters of and raised it up nine feet. Since it was a beautiful day, I opted away from blocking out the sun entirely, but made sure to create a small shade area with another pulse of magic. Then, I used to make stools for our squad and two rough beds with the help of . The effort took 80% of my mana pool, but I hardly felt it; with all the Freeform gymnastics I'd been doing at the Ock Outpost I hardly broke a sweat.

"Let me settle us in. I think it's going to be a long day," Sam said, dropping an acorn on the beds which he into a firm mattress of vines for our use.

"You know, if I'd had known you were going to make a house, I would have just changed here instead," Jolene's voice huffed through the door.

Whatever snarky remark I had planned to shoot back died in my throat as I took in her outfit. For one, it was more colors than I'd seen since coming to the surface. Everything the Wildwoodians owned was faded to various degrees, even the rough spun replacements they'd managed to make. The shirt and skirt combo Jolene was sporting was pleated in shades of vivid red and purple, trimmed in an almost golden yellow. Contrasted with her pale blue skin and the shimmer of her scales when she turned it was positively dazzling. Her auburn locks were braided shorter to her shoulders, but her bangs hung like scarlet curtains to frame her blushing face.

"I am almost certain he's actually a rock," Daniela sighed. "Blobby and Anthony communicate better and neither of them have vocal cords!"

"You look great, Jolly," Sam said, struggling against the smirk on his face.

In the most eloquent way I could manage, I pointed at Samuel and said. "What he said."

"Thanks," Jolene said, rolling her eyes but the weak smile blossomed into a blinding grin. "Now I just need to hope it wows the judges when I throw my magic in the mix."

The five of us spent a few minutes talking about things of little consequence while the time ticked down in the background. After our strong start and even my semi-clutch move during the Pillar Toss, I could tell some of the pressure was getting to Jolene. It was a funny thing; I'd seen her fight giant creatures, fish my turtle butt out of the hog horde and just generally intimidate the population of the Allied Towns by sheer reputation alone, but performing a dance stressed her out. Of course, I wasn't rock brained enough to actually voice that. Just like I didn't mention it to Samuel when he’d go drill sergeant on the farmers or when Billy zoned in on a problem enough and forgot to be meek.

While my mind did its best to gloss over the loaded guns of potential enemies in the city, I relished and ingrained the memories I made with my squad. Even in the short time we'd added Jolene and Billy, we'd only grown closer. I could hardly believe I was opposed to the idea in the beginning.

"Mages to the stage please!" The call came, halting our conversation in its tracks.

Daniela practically shoved Jolene out the door of our open concept hut while giving her an 'encouraging pat' and the rest of us followed. It still boggled my mind a bit to realize there were entire teams of Fallen terraforming for the Hog Parade. The announcer tower had gained four stages around it, each double the size of the platforms we'd been assigned for our Faction team. The stone surface had been smoothed for all of them to an almost mirror finish, but at the center of each was a different key feature. A roaring bonfire, a placid pool of water, a large corpse from one of the ubiquitous hogs along a small potted tree and a raised circular platform just as polished as the rest of the stage.

It didn't take a genius to figure out the purposes of each and the corresponding Attunements they represented, but it was incredibly impressive.

Radolfo had returned to the announcer position, though I caught a distinct air of displeasure on his expression. From his voice, however, you couldn't tell anything was going any way other than perfect. He introduced the Mage Dance, a display of mastery and control over the elements in the world after the Fall. He waxed poetic for a few minutes while the judges took position and explained their own set of information to the contestants.

Similarly to Jolene, each of them were dressed in elaborate clothes of one type or another. Yet another Tendril-- clearly they were sending a message-- represented the Breakers and I recognized Filomena and the Clanswoman Nova lined up. The Zebelos sent a hungry grin to Jolene as she arrived before focusing back on the judges. A few minutes later, silence had fallen over the crowds at Radolfo's request and the first person stepped up to the metaphorical plate.

The interesting thing about the Mage Dance as far as I understood it is that the duration of the dance was factored into the points given. That, combined with the actual performance, were ways of evaluating the dancer's 'magical aptitude' which we knew was related to the Containment and Refinement Attributes. As a result, they were burn-bright-but-quick endeavors that not only left me slackjawed, but also worried about the prospect of having to fight Fallen Tendrils or Appendages. The sheer variety of abilities we could be faced with was daunting, unlike with creatures in the wilderness who tended to have specialized paths for their magic even if they had the brawn to flex them.

Clouds of choking violet miasma formed helical patterns in the air; a sandstorm similar to my own formed rings in the air as the giant in question used them like a jump rope; Filomena breathed fire not unlike Danny before plowing through it and igniting herself and twirling viciously in the air while partly transforming her body like she'd done during our fight. A petite elf created platforms of seemingly solid air as they did acrobatics without actually having the equipment required and an orc did a rendition of a fiery octopus that bloomed out of the bonfire even while they sat crossed legged in front of it.

While those were all incredibly impressive, it was the dwarfess Nova and Jolene who stole the show. Even biased as I was towards my squadmate, the Earth Attuned's display struck a deep chord within me since I knew how ridiculously hard her dance was from an earth magic perspective.

The woman wore an unassuming dress of tans and browns, letting her crystalline hair take center stage of her performance. Doing it justice, she twirled on the raised platform as chunks of it broke off only to reveal quartz chunks. The full spectrum of quartz too; translucent, smoky, rose, amethyst, citrine and carnelian made a big showing amidst others I wasn't able to recognize on sight. Currents of beige mana carried the pieces into the air with the control I would have expected from a Life Attuned before she started blasting them out of the air with a Gift almost identical to .

Nova danced amidst the pulverized crystals raining down around her, throwing the light reflecting off her hair even further afield in a strobing rainbow. The woman levered every bit of Containment to her name, making the dance last longer than any of the others even with the higher Refinement the other Attuned usually had. When she was done, she let out a tense breath, taking a knee as the last of the crystals fell to the stage... Only to be seamlessly subsumed into the rocky platform. If my eyeballs were telling me anything then she had been the one responsible for that last show of magic also.

Jolene looked distinctly less confident after seeing that display.

"Don't worry about anyone else, just pretend you are saving my bacon again," I sent the woman through the comm-plant. I didn't know if she'd be paying attention to her Status as she focused on her performance, but I had the urge to give her a bit of support.

To my surprise, she actually chortled, getting confused looks from the other contestants near her. Her emerald eyes locked on mine as she replied. "I think I can be a bit more graceful without a sack of potatoes to lug around."

With that, she strode with renewed confidence to the water stage. When the judges gave her the go ahead, she immediately exploded into action. As a consensus between us, not in a small part influenced by Radolfo's reaction, we'd decided not to utilize any Items, much less Amplitude ones. Despite that, the mermaid had no problem leveraging her magic with the aid of the water in the pool.

The surface rose, a droplet forming a step for her to walk on as she spiraled her way higher and higher with each step. When she was over ten feet in the air, the droplets collapsed in on themselves seemingly swallowing her. The crowd gasped in surprise, but it quickly turned to stunned amazement as she hovered in a column of water, her bangs suspended in the water and her skirt rippling on invisible currents likely courtesy of her Skill. With a pulse of navy blue mana and a flare of her usually folded fins she attempted to swim out of the column of water towards the crowd. They reacted with fear as the entire thing started to tip in their direction, but the column only bulged as she swept back into the middle smoothly. Her scales glimmered as she made the water column dance while also dancing within it, enthralling everyone like a siren in the stories of old.

Ice flows formed within the water as the passive mana acted on the column of water and she blew them up into a light snow with her . Slowly, the dance turned into a gentle swim and the ice grew thicker on the surface until the mermaid was blocked from view. If it wasn't for the midday sun, it would have been impossible to see even the shadow moving within the frosted surface. Without warning, the entire thing exploded. Ice flew away from the column, but before it could threaten anyone it bubbled and popped before turning into a frigid mist that swept the stages and into the crowd. The refreshing wind rustled my hair as Jolene slid down the remains of the ice column as if it were a water slide. Her hair was plastered to her face and she was shivering under the effects of her magic, but her smile was dazzling.

Daniela discreetly helped her back to the judges as they deliberated on the scores, occasionally glancing at one or another of the contestants. The most looks were focused on Filomena, Nova and Jolene, which I wasn't particularly surprised about. After almost thirty minutes of deliberating, the head judge walked up to the announcer tower. Once Radolfo had the results, he cleared his throat to draw the attention of the crowd as the volume-augmenting magic took hold.

"We have our winners for the Mage Dance," the old man called out. "But before that, let's give them a huge hand! The wonders of magic cannot be underestimated and each year our people push the envelope of what we'd thought possible even further in their efforts to defend our way of life!"

The crowd, and the platforms, roared their approval. The energy rippled through the earth, buzzing to my senses and bringing a grin to my face despite myself. I likened the feeling to being the human equivalent of a tuning fork, and the strength of the emotions resonating in the ground spoke to me deeply. Like the roar of many of the powerful beasts we'd fought since coming to the surface, humanity as a collective had a magic of their own.

"In third place, Filomena Zebelos," the man said, not waiting for the cheers to totally die down since they resumed as soon as he spoke. "After much consideration from our judges... the runner up is Jolene Fuller of the Allied Towns."

The cheering rose again, but all I could see was the slight slump to the mermaid's shoulder as Radolfo went on to announce Nova MacKay of the Clansmen as the first place winner. Even as the cheers escorted them back to their respective platforms, the contenders all worked through their emotions. Jolene gave us a weak smile, but before she could apologize for not placing first just like I'd done Blobby rushed forward to pull her into a hug. The slime's sudden embrace caught her off guard, but when Billy piled on to the gelatinous hug the others shrugged and joined in. I laughed and wrapped my arms around our whole squad before squeezing. Blobby spilled through the gaps like goop through a strainer and the others groaned weakly in my grasp before a jab in the ribs from Daniela forced me to release them.

Everyone gasped for breath, except for Billy, and immediately started to complain about being giant-handled. I took the ribbing with a smile, since I could see the unshed tears on Jolene's face had been replaced with mock outrage. Until Daniela flicked me on the forehead and I ordered Blobby to restrain the slippery brunette for a well deserved noogie. With the scope of our concerns narrowed to the present, the prospects of just where we placed in the Hog Parade faded just a bit.